The effect of different sources of insoluble fiber on performance and carcass characteristics in broiler chicken

This experiment was designed to investigate the effects of using different insoluble fiber sources on broiler chicken’s performance and carcass characteristics. Two hundred, (200) day-old commercial male broiler chicks were randomly allotted to 4 dietary treatments with 10 replicates containing 5 birds in each replicate. The treatments consisted of a control diet and three test diets containing 2.5% insoluble fiber sources either rice hulls (RH), soya hulls (SH), or lignocellulose (Arbocel-AC). The dietary addition of lignocellulose and soya hulls significantly (P<0.01) improved the body weight gain. Dietary treatments did not influence overall feed consumption. Supplementation of insoluble fiber significantly (P<0.05) improved the feed conversion ratio (FCR) when compared to the control. The weight of liver, heart, dressing percentage and abdominal fat percent were not influenced (P>0.05) by the dietary treatments except the relative weight of the gizzard which was significantly (P<0.05) higher in birds supplemented with rice hulls than other dietary treatment groups. In summary, adding soya hulls and lignocellulose at 2.5% level improved the growth performance of broiler chicken.